City of Omaha Urban PlanningOmaha, Nebraska

Master Plan Elements

The Master Plan represents the overall vision of Omaha and has two fundamental purposes. The first provides an essential legal basis for land use regulation such as zoning and subdivision control. Secondly, a modern master plan presents a unified and compelling vision for a community, derived from the aspirations of its citizens, and establishes the specific actions necessary to fulfill that vision.

"Omaha must be a community committed to

promoting and maintaining a high quality

of life for all of its people."

The Concept Element provides a broad vision for Omaha’s future and a comprehensive package of goals, policies and standards needed to carry out the vision. These more detailed issues are addressed by "element" plans which deal with more specific functional and geographic areas of interest. The functional components:

Environment

Urban Development

Land Use

Transportation

Parks and Recreation

Housing and Community Development among others

These detailed element plans are intended to be used together with the Concept Element to guide the growth and redevelopment of the city. Even though these plans are often large in scope and detailed in nature, they all depend on the Concept Element to provide their direction and focus.

The Environment Element sets out a vision for the long-term environmental health and sustainability of the Omaha community and the natural resources and ecosystems on which it depends.

The Public Facilities Element serves as a long term guide for the development of public facilities usually not addressed in other comprehensive plan elements. This plan focuses on important support facilities which form the foundation for city services that are critical to almost every aspect of public health, safety, and welfare.

The Housing Element is the culmination of a process which attempts to identify in general terms what the residents of Omaha want. It describes what approaches would be suitable to meet neighborhood needs, and delineates appropriate initiatives given the extent of the problem and the level of City support.

The Transportation Element addresses the problems of increased traffic congestion and dependence on the automobile. It creates a new transportation system that will incorporate the needs of pedestrians, bicyclists, and transit users while continuing to accommodate the auto. Appendix

The Future Land Use Element guides the physical development of the city. It outlines general policies for the location of each of the city’s primary land uses such as industry, offices, commercial space, parks, civic facilities, and housing. One of the main purposes for directing the pattern of land development is to ensure that the city’s limited resources are used judiciously and efficiently.

One hundred years ago, H.W.S. Cleveland, hired by the Parks Board to prepare Omaha’s first Parks Plan, wrote that no other investment “...contributes equally to impress strangers with the idea of civic grandeur as such liberal provision [of parks and boulevards] for the health, comfort and gratification of residents and visitors alike.” Many of the issues emphasized by Cleveland in 1889 are reaffirmed a century later in the Master Plan's Parks Element.

The Urban Development Element in combination with the Concept Element of the City’s Master Plan, establishes a sound management system designed to achieve greater economy in the growth cycle. The system is intended to encourage the continued development of high quality suburban areas while preserving and redevel­oping our existing neighborhoods by providing City government with a more orderly method of allocating its limited capital resources.

There are three principal components of the Omaha Urban Design Element; 1. Green Omaha: The preservation and enhancement of the City’s natural setting and public park system. 2. Civic Omaha: The definition and improvement of the City’s civic places and public image. 3. Neighborhood Omaha: The preservation and enhancement of the City’s residential neighborhoods. For each component, the Plan sets forth goals, objectives and policies, followed by a section on implementation.

In the early 1970s, faced with continuing disinvestment in its historic core, the City of Omaha commissioned a Downtown Master Plan. Published in 1974, the Downtown Plan was credited by many with helping “save” the heart of the city, creating renewed interest and investment in the downtown, and generally providing a sense of direction and energy for over thirty years. In 2009, City leaders chose to revisit the topic of a downtown plan, and to lay out an ambitious program for the next twenty years of development.